GERARD

Debut album of Japanese keyboardist veteran Toshio Egawa one of projects. Opener "Meridian" sounds quite attractive - not original, but in good ELP tradition: heavy keyboards based bombastic melodic sound.

But from the second song I was disappointed: as often with Japanese prog rock bands (usually fusion or symphonic) the music is not only very secondary, but this time it's openly imitative. Keyboards sounds very synthetic, all the sound mix is unnatural, more like from cartoons, than from real life. In combination with extremely bombastic musicianship, almost all songs sound more as symphonic prog parody, soundtrack for comics, than real original compositions. Vocals are strange, spacey, but often out of place.

Some compositions are quite heavy, but it doesn't help. During all listening I had the feeling I listen to plastic joke, synthetic parody to symphonic prog release.

For heavy fans of SUCH music only.